


Reprise

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Crush, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-18
Updated: 2012-02-18
Packaged: 2017-10-31 08:48:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/342168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everything you've done has been for him and he doesn't even think of you when he says your name.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reprise

**Author's Note:**

> Slightly AU.

There is the hum of gears and the click of the clock's hands, there is the steady racing of his heart and the quiet before the storm. It follows you like enigma or like plague, the sound of the inevitable, and there isn't anything ironic about that. There isn't anything false or pretend about it. There is nothing that isn't real anymore.

You have tasted the bottom of the barrel, dragged your tongue along the slime and the dirt and the settled corpses. You have felt what you never knew existed: that unbridled flavor of something horrible. You remember the bile rising in your throat and the quiet that followed the moment after you figured it out, and then you remember puking your guts up.

That's when this persistent little buzz started up.

The gears and wheels of whatever elaborate, cosmic clock: tick tick ticking away in your head. Drilling little holes out the top of your skull. Of course it is maddening. You hear it right now, stuck in a ship between universes, and it never fades. It never lets up. You're stuck with it and it's stuck with you. And you think, just for the smallest of moments you actually stop and _think_ that you might be getting used to it.

But of course you're not.

John is snoozing away on one of the beds and you're half-sat, half-floating on the cot beside him. The ship is huge and you think that you could explore it forever and never get used to it. But this is your home, three years stuck in this shitty tin can and the person most important to you just a few feet away.

You think that you're getting used to this as well, but of course you can't.

You adjusted to the sword through your stomach. You adjusted to the sensation of wings, the sensation of floating and flying, the sensation of not having any goddamn legs, just a slithering tail like some sort of freakish comic book reject.

But this isn't something you can adjust to.

John takes a nap while you sit there and watch the rise and fall of his chest, the faint stirring and twitch of his eyelids, and you think: I love him.

Of course you do. You always did. That was something you realized a fuck of a long time ago, and you're not even sure if it applies to the other Daves wandering around-- because offshoot timelines and all of that noise-- but you know it. It is as clear as the sky is blue and there is this heavy, heavy feeling in the pit of your chest every time you think of it. It's more piercing than the literal shard of metal stuck in you so deep it sticks out the other side, and you think you'd prefer a physical pain to this.

There's nothing good about this.

As soon as the other Dave got the hang of the game, of how it works and how it functions and what he's supposed to do, you're shuffled off to the side and forgotten. No one remembers you. No one knows what you've struggled through. Months and months of the hardest thing in the entire world, that terrible thing being the world itself. A world where that stupid fucking doofus across from you now was _dead_.

Learning the ins and outs in a place like that was hell. You nearly faced off against what was not the unbeatable boss of this timeline, but something fairly difficult down half your players: it was just you and Rose at the end of the world, trying to save everyone's asses. And you did that more than once: repeat. Repeat. You turned over the hourglass again and again and again until you learned, until you knew what was going on, and until you had your plan hatched.

And you think without a moment's hesitation you'd do it over again ten times. But it hurts. Everything you've done has been for him and he doesn't even think of you when he says your name.

You're not "the real Dave". You're a fake and an imitation and it is so ruthlessly cruel for him to say that to you after all you have been through. All of that for his ungrateful ass.

But again, you think: that doesn't matter. Your plan hasn't turned out the way you wanted it to, not exactly-- you never foresaw half the shit that has gone down. But you're here now, and you are alive, and more importantly than that: he is alive.

John is alive.

Your best friend isn't dead, and that fills you with a sort of strength you didn't know you had. You want to win this game, even if you don't know what will happen once you do, and you want to see the unapologetic and ungrateful sack of shit sleeping right there _smile_. You want that more than anything, and you think more than _anyone_ else too.

You're drifting off towards him now, steadily growing in creepiness by the minute, and you think: fuck, does he ever look peaceful.

Your wings fold and twitch behind you and you brush his forehead with your hand. John is so stupid. You don't smile-- because that would be uncool, that would be weird, because the _real_ Dave doesn't smile unless it's ironically-- but you do heave a big sigh. You feel the air enter your lungs and you feel the heaviness of unrequited love. Then you look away, toward the hallway, and promptly jump a foot into the air.

Jade is standing there.

You try to shrug off the way you startled and you would make some casual gesture at John but you find you can't really do that under the kind of eyes she's giving you. So you just awkwardly shuffle away and towards her, trying to brush past without saying a word. But Jade is a quick girl and she's catching your wrist in her hands. She's strong too.

You're strong, in fact you're the tiniest bit built-- as built as a malnourished thirteen year old kid can get. ( _Thanks, Bro._ ) But Jade puts that all to shame. She is tall and she is solid as a brick house and you don't stand a damn chance against her, especially not with how you're injured. So you just kind of let her drag you off, digging in your figurative heels ( _because you don't have any fucking feet anymore_ ) on account of it not being cool enough otherwise.

You go to talk, but fuck if she doesn't hush you up real quick.

"He's sleeping!!" she tells you, all harsh whispers, and you grimace under her palm. "Don't wake him up, dumbass."

The two of you end up on the top deck of the ship. The scenery speeding by at the speed of light and nothing seeming to move at all. She turns to you then, stares you down curiously and you can't bite back your comment: "What? Do I have some fuckin spinach in my teeth? Some grease on my shirt from the fried chicken-- ha ha what a joke that was, because you know, I'm part bird-- you guys alchemized up for dinner?"

"What were you doing?" Jade asks with a quixotic look on her face, this little half-smile but the quirk of her eyebrows and the upward inflection of her voice. God damn it.

"What, that? There was something stuck to his face and it was bugging me so I got it off." You say it as casually as you can muster, as though you were actually doing that and not some tender little gesture, some small self-indulgence. You regret it. This is how it will always turn out, as sure as bone can break. Awkwardly and a mess of ruffled feathers. You know your excuse is lame, and the look she's giving you now is just more proof of it.

Her eyes are narrowed and her hands are on her hips, and she's giving you that SPILL THE FUCKING BEANS kind of look, and there's nowhere you can run and hide. You're ashamed, and isn't that just the most uncool thing you ever felt aside from the longing and the love and the tenderness and the crushing _sadness_ , all directed in your best bro's direction.

She is silent and you are silent and suddenly you are stricken by the urge to actually say it. To actually spill everything, let the cat out of the bag and to let the truth pour on out of your mouth in a frothing and putrid rainbow of word vomit. But you say nothing, and nothing still. She says similarly but gives you one last glance over, a pitying little frown-- and you feel sick to your stomach-- before she finally says whatever she's thinking.

"It'll be okay, Davesprite." Fuck.

Dave, not Davesprite. Just Dave. "I don't know what you're talking about." Like it's no big deal.

"I was just... whatever. I'm not gonna play twenty questions, ok?"

"Sounds like you're doing it right now." You can't help but sound a bit defensive. Because fuck, you're thirteen years old-- fourteen by now, with all the time loops you've been through. But exacts don't matter. The point is, you're young and you aren't as cool as you think you are.

"Sooooorry."

With the squeak of her shoes and a single look tossed over her shoulder, Jade leaves you. You shuffle your wings together and wipe your palm off on your shirt, above the crusted blood, and you wonder just exactly when you became this weak.


End file.
